{"id":31382,"date":"2020-07-13T20:56:55","date_gmt":"2020-07-13T20:56:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/defensenews\/uncategorized\/2020\/07\/13\/us-to-launch-four-intelligence-payloads-july-15\/"},"modified":"2026-08-08T18:16:41","modified_gmt":"2026-08-08T18:16:41","slug":"us-to-launch-four-intelligence-payloads-july-15","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/defensenews\/space\/2020\/07\/13\/us-to-launch-four-intelligence-payloads-july-15\/","title":{"rendered":"US to launch four intelligence payloads July 15"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Four National Reconnaissance Office payloads will be launched into orbit July 15, continuing the agency\u2019s efforts to leverage the small commercial launch market for its missions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The U.S. Space Force\u2019s Space and Missile Systems Center announced July 11 that it successfully completed its flight readiness review, putting the launch on track for its 9 a.m. ET window at the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport at NASA\u2019s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia.<\/p>\n\n\n\t<aside class=\"smg-interstitial-link wp-block-smg-interstitial-link\">\n\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/c4isrnet\/space\/2020\/07\/10\/nro-and-space-force-sticking-with-rocket-lab-after-failed-launch\/\" class=\"smg-interstitial-link__inner\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"smg-interstitial-link__media\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"300\" height=\"169\" src=\"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/Electron-at-Launch-Complex-2.JPG.jpg?w=300\" class=\"smg-interstitial-link__image wp-post-image\" alt=\"\" \/>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"smg-interstitial-link__content\">\n\t\t\t\t<span class=\"smg-interstitial-link__kicker\">Related<\/span>\n\t\t\t\t<h3 class=\"smg-interstitial-link__title\">NRO and Space Force stick with Rocket Lab despite failed launch<\/h3>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<p class=\"smg-interstitial-link__excerpt\">Despite an anomaly that caused the company&#039;s most recent launch to fail to reach orbit, both the Pentagon and the intelligence community are moving forward with their scheduled missions with Rocket Lab.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/a>\n\t<\/aside>\n\t\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">For the National Reconnaissance Office Launch-129 (NROL-129) mission, four payloads built and designed by NRO will be placed on orbit. The agency, which is charged with acquiring and managing the nation\u2019s intelligence satellites, typically does not release details about the payloads it places on orbit or their purpose, and NROL-129 is not an exception. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The launch contract was awarded through the U.S. Air Force\u2019s Orbital\/Suborbital Program-3, or OSP-3, a contract mechanism designed to take advantage of commercial small launch providers. OSP-3 expired in November 2019 <a href=\"https:\/\/www.c4isrnet.com\/battlefield-tech\/space\/2020\/04\/13\/space-force-picks-launch-provider-for-44-technology-demonstration-satellites\/\" target=_blank>and was replaced by OSP-4<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cWe look forward to launching NROL-129 for our National Reconnaissance Office customer,\u201d Brig. Gen. Jason Cothern, Space and Missile Systems Center vice commander and Air Force program executive officer for space enterprise, said in a statement. \u201cThis is a great example of using SMC\u2019s small launch contracts to expand our capability to provide reliable assured access to space.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The NROL-129 mission will use one of Northrop Grumman\u2019s Minotaur IV rockets, which are capable of launching payloads up to 3,814 pounds into low Earth orbit. This is the first time an NRO mission has taken place on a Minotaur IV rocket, although the Air Force previously used them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cWe have successfully launched 26 Minotaur missions with our last Minotaur mission from Wallops in 2013,\u201d said Lt. Col. Ryan Rose, chief of SMC\u2019s Small Launch and Targets Division. \u201cThis will be our first U.S. Space Force mission and the first dedicated NRO mission from Wallops. We look forward to continuing to launch national priority satellites for our NRO partner.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This will be the NRO\u2019s first mission launched from U.S. soil in 2020, since <a href=\"https:\/\/www.c4isrnet.com\/battlefield-tech\/space\/2020\/01\/23\/the-us-will-launch-its-next-spy-satellite-from-new-zealand\/\" target=_blank>its other two launches<\/a> took place <a href=\"https:\/\/www.c4isrnet.com\/battlefield-tech\/space\/2020\/06\/13\/rocket-lab-launches-three-more-us-spy-satellites-into-orbit-from-new-zealand\/\" target=_blank>from Rocket Lab\u2019s New Zealand facility<\/a>. Those two launches were acquired with the new Rapid Acquisition of a Small Rocket contract vehicle, a mechanism adopted by the agency in 2018 that \u2014 like OSP-3 and OSP-4 \u2014 seeks to leverage the commercial small satellite launch market for government launches.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Four National Reconnaissance Office satellites are set to be launched into low Earth orbit on a Northrop Grumman Minotaur IV rocket.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":59089,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-noindex":"","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-nofollow":"","_yoast_wpseo_canonical":"","_acf":"","_yoast_wpseo_primary_category":23,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_smg_distribution_targets":[]},"categories":[160,163,36,23],"tags":[],"coauthors":[3385],"class_list":["post-31382","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-daily-news-roundup","category-military-space-report","category-newsletters","category-space"],"acf":{"subheadline":"","legacy_arc_id":"MPW4QXUSFNCG3H5Z67PJ4FCFH4","arc_canonical_url":"\/battlefield-tech\/space\/2020\/07\/13\/us-to-launch-four-intelligence-payloads-july-15\/","remove_feature_photo":false,"is_sponsored":false,"subtype":"","redirect_url":"","disable_inline_ads":false,"native_logo_pretext":"Presented By:"},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v26.0 (Yoast SEO v28.1) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>US to launch four intelligence payloads July 15 - Defense News<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Four National Reconnaissance Office satellites are set to be launched into low Earth orbit on a Northrop Grumman Minotaur IV rocket.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/c4isrnet\/space\/2020\/07\/13\/us-to-launch-four-intelligence-payloads-july-15\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"US to launch four intelligence payloads July 15\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Four National Reconnaissance Office satellites are set to be launched into low Earth orbit on a Northrop Grumman Minotaur IV rocket.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/defensenews\/space\/2020\/07\/13\/us-to-launch-four-intelligence-payloads-july-15\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Defense News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2020-07-13T20:56:55+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2026-08-08T18:16:41+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Nathan Strout\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Nathan Strout\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\n\t    \"@context\": \"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\n\t    \"@graph\": [\n\t        {\n\t            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